(258f) The Mechanism Investigation for Process Intensification of the Esterification Reaction By Microwave Irradiation

Microwave has long been recognized to accelerate the rate of chemical reactions. However, the scientists still clash on the question what is main reason of the microwave intensification effect for this acceleration. Microwave changing the relative volatility of some special mixtures discovered by our previous research may open up new insight. For some reactions that have significantly limited by chemical equilibrium, if the product concentration in reaction system can be reduced through the changing the relative volatility of reaction system, the acceleration of reaction rate can be occurred by the special effect of microwave. In this paper, esterification, a typical equilibrium limitation reaction, has been chosen to determine the intensification effect of microwave. The experimental equipment installs a drainage system to move the water that is one of the reaction products. According to compare the experimental results under microwave and traditional heating, the hypothesis can be verified. Moreover, the main influence factor for reactive conversion, microwave power and reaction temperature were systematically investigated in detail to build the kinetic of this reaction in microwave. Experimental results show that microwave improved drainage can realize the reactive acceleration. The intensification effect of microwave for some reactions also can be explained by the investigation results.